This Spirited New Cookbook Avoids The Hot And Heavy In Italian

Food

Forget the lasagna, the slow-simmered sauces, the hundreds of calories and expanding waistlines. Instead, think of roasted red peppers with basil, fresh tuna salad and cherries poached in chianti.

Enter ``Cucina Fresca,`` a spirited cookbook that dispels the myth of heavy Italian food. ``Cucina Fresca,`` by Viana La Place and Evan Kleiman

(Harper & Row, $10.95), is filled with 225 Italian recipes, simply prepared and served cold or at room temperature. ``Cucina Fresca captures the spirit of the food we love,`` explains La Place and Kleiman in the introduction of their book. ``Two simple words express our point of view; cucina translates as kitchen, cuisine, cooking and the food itself; fresca means fresh, new and cool in temperature.``

La Place and Kleiman met in Los Angeles in 1981 while cooking in the kitchen of Mangia, an Italian restaurant. Both previously had persued nonfood careers; La Place studied art, and Kleiman studied film and Italian literature. Extensive travel and eating in Italy, from their early teens on, has had a profound influence on their lives and career choices.

Kleiman, in town recently on a book publicity tour, says, ``I honestly thought I would work in the movie business. And I tried it for a while. But it`s not the same satisfaction as cooking--all the gratification is postponed. ``Food has instant gratification and you get to share it with others in a very warm, nonthreatening atmosphere. I walked into the food business four years ago and haven`t left since.``

Kleiman admits she doesn`t care for many of today`s food trends. She dislikes heavily reduced sauces. Instead, she prefers adding flavor by marinating food with fresh herbs, high-quality vinegars and oils. She also speaks freely about the trend of worshipping food: ``I don`t like to have a real rigid attitude about food--our generation has used food as a special thing--elevating it to a precious level and taking it too seriously. After all food is something everyone needs for nourishment. In Italy the mothers and grandmothers have food in the right perspective: honest and full of love.``

Today La Place travels, writes food articles and develops recipes. Kleiman is chef/owner of the praised Los Angeles cafe-pizzeria Angeli. They already are collaborating on a second cookbook, this time about southern Italian food. ``Cucina Fresca`` is the first they have written.

All the recipes in ``Cucina Fresca`` are tempting. La Place and Kleiman stress the use of fresh, high-quality ingredients throughout. Most of the recipes require a minimum of ingredients and have simple, traditional Italian preparations. A few recipes are adaptations of classic Italian dishes.

There are some minor editing criticisms: Recipe directions are in one paragraph; numbered steps are usually much easier for the cook to follow. Page numbers listed after recipe titles in suggested menus would be a great service. And sometimes recipe titles are only given in Italian.

Several recipes were tested in The Tribune test kitchen. The tasters favorites and the authors` comments follow:

La Place and Kleiman say, ``The lovely combination of the slightly acid tomatoes and the buttersmooth avocado is punctuated with the sweet bite of the red onion.``

2. ARRANGE TOMATOES SO THEY JUST OVERLAP ALONG THE BOTTOM EDGE OF INDIVIDUAL PLATES. PUT AVOCADO SLICES IN A FAN SHAPE ABOVE TOMATOES. SPRINKLE ONION RINGS ON TOP OF TOMATOES. LIGHTLY SPRINKLE VINEGAR AND OIL TO TASTE OVER ALL. SPRINKLE WITH PEPPER.

``THE COMBINATION OF THE SWEET AND SOUR FLAVORS OF THE BALSAMIC VINEGAR AND SUGAR ENHANCES THE FLAVORS OF THE STRAWBERRIES. THIS

IS AN EXCELLENT WAY TO SERVE BERRIES THAT ARE NOT QUITE AS SWEET AS THEY COULD BE.``

THE MAESTRO`S BERRIES

STRAWBERRIES, WASHED AND WITH STEM ON SUGAR

BALSAMIC VINEGAR

1. LET THE STRAWBERRIES DRY AND ARRANGE IN A SERVING BOWL. 2. SUPPLY EACH GUEST WITH A SMALL DESSERT PLATE. POUR ABOUT

1 TABLESPOON OF SUGAR ON EACH PLATE. POUR JUST ENOUGH BALSAMIC VINEGAR, ABOUT 2 TEASPOONS, OVER THE MOUND OF SUGAR SO THAT A